Question about mailing bows

[Rooselk]

Where does one buy a 70" mailing tube? This week I need to send out a 68" longbow to be refinished and restored. Any ideas as to where I should begin to look for a sturdy mailing tube of that length?

[Deadbolt]

i go to the post office and they have free triangular boxes i think they are 24" or so...i just get a few of em feed em one inside the other tape em all up and pack with bubble wrap.  works like a charm!

plus they are free!!!

you could go get some pvc but its gonna cost you an arm and a leg to ship!  and i think the prices have changed in the last year about shipping sizes so make it as small as you can.

[Toxophilite]

The very best way to ship a longbow is with a 3" PVC tube, capped on both ends.  I hear that carpeting tubes make great shipping tubes for longbows but they're hard to get around here.

[ishoot4thrills]

I am with Deadbolt on this. I used 3 of those triangular boxes to ship a 64" longbow last week and they worked great. I used 2 together and then added 1 around the middle for reinforcement and shipped it via USPS Priority.

[JRY309]

I just went to my local hardware store this morning and bought a 3" PVC sewer pipe 3000# crush.It is a thinner pipe doesn't weigh as much as schedule 40 pipe.It was $12 and 10' long I just cut it down to the length I needed.Then I take the rest of it and cut it in half and make some arrow tubes for storing arrows.

[vermonster13]

The PO boxes are a poor choice for mailing longbows, they never arrive in good shape. Check this thread out.

 http://tradgang.com/noncgi/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=054467#000000

[SCATTERSHOT]

Second (or third) the lightweight PVC pipe. You can also buy a section of plastic downspout that will work.

Whatever you decide on, remember that the tips of a longbow act like a spear when the apes at the PO start throwing the package around, so pad the heck out of 'em.

[Flatshooter]

Read a post recently from a guy who use to work for the airlines. He suggested that if you are packing a bow in any kind of round tube that you take precautions to rig it so it doesn't roll. The tubes come off the conveyer belt and frequently roll off and sometime get run over by the baggage truck. They sometimes get caught and jammed up under the belt. I just set a longbow out to the boys at Black Widow in a tube. I taped three pieces of 1/4 round at equal distances along the length of the tube to stop it from rolling. John and Toby got a kick out of that but thought it was a good idea. Good luck!

[Rooselk]

Since there's a Home Depot less than 5 minutes from my house, I went over there and bought the 3" light sewer pipe that was suggested. The pipe and two end caps came to just a little over $6. Not bad at all.

Thank you very much for all the suggestions. I knew I count on you folks.  

[john fletch]

I was able to get some 8' flourescent light boxes from the hardware store.  I slice the sides off with a breakaway knife and make my own triangular boxes 1 piece in length.  The triangle is stronger than the square for shipping.  The dirty dogs at UPS, FedX and USPS still 'cube' it so it does not save any $$ shipping!